What is Bootstrap?

Many developers use and praise similar frameworks, and many condemn and slander them. But which one is right? Is it worth using bootstrap? The answer is clear - try bootstrap on at least 1-3 projects, the bigger the project, the more you will feel its benefits. Once you have at least this experience, then you can join one of the parties that condemns or praises. I decided to write this article because I belonged to a group that condemns bootstrap. I excused him and the others, but after a while I found myself in the second group. It happened so simply because I finally tried it on a few projects. The more I got to know this framework, the more I liked its features. Today, bootstrap forms the basis of every project I create, and I can't imagine it without it.

Clear and detailed documentation

One of the biggest advantages of the bootstrap framework is its documentation. When you write code in accordance with the bootstrap and its functions, it is easy for others to understand. It's definitely nicer to navigate the maintained framework than the code that the developer pasted "tailor-made". This level and clarity is based on the developer's experience. If a developer does not have at least 2-3 years of experience in creating websites then it is almost obvious that what he has written will have at least flaws.

When creating a website completely, it often happens that something is forgotten and it is necessary to add some text or a box somewhere. You don't have to create new css components because these little things are easily covered by bootstrap.

Bootstrap saves time

The purpose of the css framework is their ease of use. You only influence the appearance of the component (size, color, etc.) and everything else is handled by the bootstrap (hover, focus, functionality, accessibility, etc.) for you. Using bootstrap:

Avoid inconsistent display in browsers

We save time by assembling finished components (most applies to forms)

We do not perceive the web as a whole or a page, but as a number of components

We save time with javascript functions, which cover all the most common functions that we will need when creating a website

Twitter Bootstrap

Twitter employees were bothered by inconsistencies in various applications in the company, their appearance was different and it was necessary to know a specific style to modify them. That's why they started working on a universal CSS framework, which the company eventually released as open-source. This means that you can use it freely for commercial purposes and you don't even have to mention it anywhere. Bootstrap is definitely not something you should be ashamed of, on the contrary, it has become a brand that guarantees a modern and well-functioning coat for the web where it is used. But the best is a huge number of freely available templates, which are imaginative, very diverse in appearance and, after minor modifications, will serve as a working basis for your work. Starting to use the CSS framework is a similar step for developers as starting to use CSS and not writing styles directly into HTML, as was the case in 1995. Of course, you can create your own framework, but in this course we will focus on the existing Bootstrap. You will work faster and cheaper. What more could you want?

Responsive and mobile-friendly

Bootstrap copies the latest trends in web design. The most important are:

Responsiveness - Bootstrap styles are perfectly adapted for mobile devices. He is therefore 100% responsive. And mobile phones are now more common devices on the web than traditional computers. You definitely don't want you to lose customers just because someone opened your site on your cell phone and the font is so small they can't read it.

Mobile-first - The framework was completely rewritten in version 3 to support the mobile-first approach. Its code is thus more compact and supports good practices.

Flat design - What is not flat today? Your site will look fresh and more. And when the trend changes, you can be sure that Bootstrap will respond. And if you don't like flat, you can download any of the other schemes available for Bootstrap (see below).

Grid - Contains a twelve-column grid system. If you already know the benefits of a grid system, you know that in most cases it will completely replace the positioning of elements on the page, which is then also regular and responsive.

It's free - Bootstrap is free for commercial purposes as well.

Layouts

Creating a page layout is quite complicated. This is not a Bootstrap error, but a general fact. You need to define a lot of things here, including a responsive menu, a search form, footers, and so on. All this is expected by our user or customer on a regular page. And Bootstrap is about CSS styles, we would still have to write the HTML framework ourselves. However, Bootstrap elegantly solved this as well and offered some of the most frequently used layouts as skeletons of websites with Bootstrap ready.

I think we got a very good idea of what Bootstrap can do and why it's a good idea to use CSS frameworks.